Qualifying gamble paid off for Timo Glock and BMW

BMW Motorsport driver Timo Glock took his fifth DTM career victory at Zandvoort today, and despite being in control for the entire race, it wasn’t an easy enterprise for the Team RMG driver.

Glock scored his second pole of the season, taking the lead at the start of the race. “Our main difficulty was the front left tyre, as it comes under too much pressure here,” said the German driver. “The first stint was good, but I made some tyre pressure adjustments for my second set which I’m not sure were the right call. The front right was locking and I had vibrations. Thankfully, I was able to manage the situation very well and get a good result for Team RMG and BMW.”

The Team RMG driver is fourth in the championship classification, 16 points behind the leader, Audi’s René Rast. Glock joked about what, so far, is his best season in the DTM: “Well, I’m on double the points now with regards to what I normally do. My target for this year was to be on the top five, I’m being more consistent, so we can start to look at our next step.”

Glock is also now the best-placed BMW driver in the championship standings. Asked if thinking about the fight for the title is a realistic target for him, the German driver replied: “It’s hard, because you have to score points in every race. Audi has an advantage with race pace, so the target to have a best chance of winning is to be on pole position, but that’s a hard thing to achieve on every track.”

BMW Motorsport director Jens Marquardt explained the key for today’s result, with the Bavarian cars taking the top four positions on the grid and locking the race podium. “We took a gamble on qualifying today. We normally do a first attempt and try to improve, but we could see that rain was coming on the radar, so we sent some drivers out to do their best on their first lap. That paid off for us, and was a very good starting point in a track like Zandvoort.”

“The challenge was managing the tyres. There were some guys who stopped on the first lap, but we couldn’t have managed that, so we had a more conservative strategy. We have now three guys that are close in the championship fight, so I’m very happy that we have good potential for the season,” concluded Marquardt.